Hotel workers at the Fairfield by Marriott Manhattan Times Square and the Four Points by Sheraton Midtown have finally landed a union contract, ending 47 days on the picket line and nearly four years of fighting since they first voted to unionize. The workers will get immediate wage increases of $10 to $15 per hour, retirement benefits, free family health care, and more than $50,000 in back pay each.
The announcement came from the Office of New York City Comptroller Mark Levine, which noted the workers voted to join the New York Hotel and Trades Council back in 2022 and had been pushing for a fair contract ever since. According to the New York City Central Labor Council, AFL-CIO, the strike and boycott began on June 29, 2026, with workers picketing outside 326 West 40th Street in Midtown for the full 47 days until the deal was reached in mid-August. The two limited-service properties sit adjacent to each other at 330 and 326 West 40th Street, just steps from the Port Authority Bus Terminal, according to Expedia.
Years of Bargaining Behind the Deal
The fight traces back to October 21, 2022, when housekeeping and engineering employees at the two hotels voted to join the Hotel Trades Council by a 76% majority in a National Labor Relations Board election, per the Hotel Trades Council. What followed was nearly four years of contract negotiations, during which the union filed multiple unfair labor practice charges accusing hotel management of failing to bargain in good faith, discriminating against union supporters, and replacing union positions with subcontracted agency workers, the labor council reported. National labor research cited during the picket line effort found that roughly half of newly organized workplaces nationwide fail to reach a first contract within four years of winning a union election, according to ZNetwork.
Before the contract, non-union housekeeping staff at the Fairfield and Four Points properties earned an average of $20.56 per hour, with some making as little as $17.82 per hour, leaving them roughly $21.81 per hour, or nearly $40,000 annually, behind unionized housekeepers elsewhere in the city, per the labor council's account. Workers picketed through what the comptroller's office described as 100-degree weather, rainstorms, and wildfire smoke over the course of the strike.
Elected Officials Join the Picket Line
The strike drew heavy political backing. Over 200 striking workers received support on the West 40th Street picket line from Mayor Zohran Mamdani, New York State Attorney General Letitia James, City Comptroller Mark Levine, City Council Speaker Julie Menin, and Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, according to a Business Wire release cited in the research. Elected officials reportedly stood with workers beneath a giant inflatable Scabby the Rat and urged tourists and city visitors to observe the boycott of the two hotels.
That kind of mobilization fits within a broader pattern for the Hotel and Gaming Trades Council, which represents an estimated 35,000 to 40,000 hospitality and gaming workers across New York City and northern and central New Jersey and maintains representation across roughly 75 percent of the city's hotel industry, per InfluenceWatch. Hoodline previously reported on union mobilization ahead of possible strikes tied to this year's World Cup, as the union built out citywide organizing teams well before this fight came to a head.
How This Fits the Citywide Contract Picture
The Fairfield and Four Points victory lands just months after HTC's biggest citywide win. In May, more than 6,000 HTC members ratified a new eight-year Industry-Wide Agreement with the Hotel Association of New York City, securing multi-year wage increases for an estimated 27,000 to 30,000 hotel workers across nearly 250 properties, according to the Hotel and Gaming Trades Council. That master contract sets standard wages, healthcare, and pension benefits across the industry, but newly organized non-union properties like the Fairfield and Four Points typically need their own ground campaigns and legal charges before employers agree to match those citywide standards, per the labor council.
Legislative changes also shaped the fight. The NYC Safe Hotels Act, enacted in November 2024 and effective since May 2025, requires hotels with 100 or more guest rooms to directly employ core operational staff, including housekeeping and front desk workers, and bars the use of third-party staffing agencies, according to Seyfarth Shaw LLP. The subcontracting ban was central to HTC's organizing push, since agency workers were often paid less without union protections. Hoodline also reported earlier this year on whistleblower claims against the union that surfaced during the citywide Industry-Wide Agreement talks around the same time.
